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October 07th 2013:He Just Won’t Quit! Who is Dr. Clarence Jones Really?

Why did Martin Luther King, Jr. trust this man so much? Yes, Dr. Clarence B. Jones assisted in drafting King’s “I Have a Dream” speech, was his lawyer, and personally brought the “Letter from Birmingham Jail” to the light of day. But how does a Black man in America go from spending time in a foster home to iconic history? What are his personal thoughts that helped change the course of history? What didn’t happen that he knows would have caused justice to surge higher? What held him together then and now? How far are we from a country, and maybe a world, from a place where character trumps

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Dr. Clarence B. Jones

His service to Martin Luther King, Jr. includes helping to draft the famous “I Have a Dream” speech. Born in 1931, Dr. Clarence B. Jones spent time in a foster home. He graduated from Columbia University, after being discharged from the military for refusing to sign a declaration that he had no ties to Communism. Jones later became a lawyer on King’s legal team and was his draft speechwriter. A trusted advisor of King's, Jones delivered the famed "Letter from Birmingham Jail" to the clergy in Birmingham in 1963. He acted as a negotiator during the Attica Prison Riots in 1971 at the request of Gov. Rockefeller and the inmates. He is an undeniably capable businessman, respected professor, acti